Sky Blue FC is looking for players with the dream of playing soccer at the professional level. The NJ/NY franchise in Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) announced today dates for tryouts for the 2009 season.
Sky Blue FC will conduct two separate tryouts - open tryouts and invitation-only tryouts. These tryouts will be held in conjunction on February 25th and 26th at the GoodSports USA Facility in Wall, NJ. All participants must preregister for the tryouts.
Scouts from Sky Blue FC's W-League amateur affiliate, the Hudson Valley Quickstrike Lady Blues, will also be in attendance. The Lady Blues will serve as a feeder/identification program for the Sky Blue FC professional team. The teams will train together during the season and the staffs of both teams will share evaluation and development strategies.
Sky Blue FC – the NJ/NY entry into Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) – announced today that the club has secured agreements in principle with Australians Sarah Walsh and Collette McCallum for the 2009 season.
Both Walsh and McCallum are expected to be in uniform when Sky Blue FC kicks off its first season in WPS. The team will host the Los Angeles Sol on April 5, 2009 at TD Bank Ballpark in Bridgewater, NJ in its debut match. (888-SBFC-TIX - TICKETS)
The Australia Women’s National Team members are the first two internationals to come to terms with Sky Blue FC for the WPS inaugural season. Sky Blue FC obtained the negotiating rights to Walsh in the WPS International Draft in on September 24, 2008. The Aussie forward was the club’s first-round selection and the seventh-overall pick. A central midfielder, McCallum was picked up by Sky Blue FC as a post-draft discovery player two days later.
Sky Blue FC - the NJ/NY entry into Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) - announced today that the team will open its first-ever season at home on Sunday, April 5, 2009. Sky Blue FC will take on the Los Angeles Sol at TD Bank Ballpark in Bridgewater, NJ in its first-ever game.
Sky Blue FC will call Rutgers University's Yurcak Field in Piscataway, NJ its home for the 2009 season but the team's home opener will be moved to TD Bank Ballpark to accommodate the larger crowd expected for the franchise debut. TD Bank Ballpark is the home of the Somerset Patriots baseball team in the Atlantic League and will seat approximately 7,000 fans when configured for soccer.
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The complete Sky Blue FC schedule will be announced in late January along with the rest of the WPS slate. Fox Soccer Channel's national television schedule will follow the league schedule announcement.
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Sky Blue Soccer announced today that Kelly Lindsey has been hired to fill the role of assistant coach for the organization’s pro team Sky Blue FC – the NJ/NY entry into Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS). Lindsey joins head coach and general manager Ian Sawyers on the Sky Blue FC staff after serving as the head women’s soccer coach at Saint Mary’s College in California.
Lindsey guided the Saint Mary’s program the past three seasons after spending two years as the top assistant to Chris Petrucelli at the University of Texas. She also served as an assistant coach at the University of Colorado for one season in 2003. A United States Soccer Federation “A” License holder, Lindsey also worked with the US Under-21 National Team in 2004.
The former University of Notre Dame standout will be reunited with Sawyers after playing for him for three seasons with the San Jose CyberRays of the Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA) from 2001 to 2003.
CLICK HERE for the whole story about Kelly Lindsey and Sky Blue FC ...
By Ian Sawyers
Reprinted with permission from Soccer America
When I was growing up a soccer-mad youngster in England, the way we truly learned to play was by copying the game we watched. Whether it was on television, or for those lucky enough to soak it up at a live match, our "lessons" came by going out to the streets, and in informal kick-rounds, attempting to copy the professionals we had seen play the game.
My wife, Hall of Fame soccer star Julie Foudy, tells a different story of her childhood. It includes her early memories of the only available athlete role models she could find -- professional American football and basketball players.
It's true that in the past in this country, it's been difficult to find the top players to imitate, especially for girls. But the new Women's Professional Soccer league, and teams like Sky Blue FC, are a positive step in the right direction. Now, you can complete the pieces of your soccer education with the third, and vital part, of the equation: train, play, watch.
Why watch the game? There are a lot of reasons, but as an educational tool it's simple: you can't do what you can't see. Soccer is a visual game and a lot of young players are visual learners.
Establishing mental images by watching my heroes play provided me with a road map equal to watching a TV re-run. I knew what was coming next in a given situation as I felt I had already seen it and lived it, and all I had to do was copy the movement.
A sports psychologist and old friend of mine once told me "the brain cannot differentiate between what is real and what is imagined." This has helped me a lot in my coaching career to try and encourage a constant use of mental imagery and "creating good pictures" in the soccer brain. It is said that the best players have good vision -- the seeming ability to see the entire field and anticipate potential movement. Sure, this comes from playing experience, but this experience also includes the careful attention to the skill of experts and role models and thus the formation of "positive pictures."
There are many ways to watch the game, each of them valuable and interesting. Watch with an eye toward different aspects of play. Isolate your watching experience. Start with the warm-up, one of the most essential parts of the game, and often overlooked by youth players. The warm-up of a professional entails many parts. It has a progression; it is physical (what they do); emotional and mental (How they act and feel. For example, do they chat with teammates? Are they silent and focused on their effort?). Imagine what would work best for you in a warm-up, or for your team.
During the game, try focusing on a player in your position, and then, switch focus to another aspect, such as movement off the ball. Most people watch the obvious -- the action with the ball -- but it is the activity that goes on all around that sets up that pass or shot.
Consider this: on average, a player runs between 5 and 6.5 miles per game, yet the distance that player covers with possession of the ball is only 2 percent of that, about 200 yards. So obviously, there's a lot to learn by watching what goes on all over the field.
Finally, watch the game because you enjoy it. What happens on the field is just a part of what WPS will offer you. Game days are also opportunities to celebrate your sport, and to share an exciting and fun experience with family, friends and teammates. It is also one of the rare opportunities to be with them in a relatively relaxed atmosphere, without the stress of usual of competition with your club or school teams. And, too, you will share that sense of pride when you look out at the greatest women players in the world and think: I play that game too. And I can dream to become one of those players.
(Ian Sawyers is the general manager and head coach of Sky Blue FC , the NY/NJ franchise of Women's Professional Soccer. As former head coach of the women's professional San Jose CyberRays, he led that team to the inaugural championship of the WUSA.)
Sky Blue was in the news a lot this week with the Allocations and the USWNT game. Here are some links to read up about Sky Blue's week so far.
9/18: U.S. women win without much fanfare - Star-Ledger
9/18: U.S. national team treats Morris residents to women's soccer win - Daily Record
9/18: Busy Day of Role Modeling for O'Reilly - USWNT Blog
9/18: Big job ahead for women's soccer league - Jersey Journal
9/18: Women's Professional Soccer latest to roll in NYC - am New York
9/17: Meet the "New" Jersey Girl: Hawaiian-born Kai wins over local fans - Big Apple Soccer
9/17: Sky Blue FC's roster will hold 3 gold-medal winners - Daily Record
9/17: New women's soccer league - Varsity Aces
9/16: W-Leaguers among WPS allocations - USL
9/16: New League for Women Seeks Longevity - New York Times
9/16: Top Soccer players coming to NY-NJ - The Record
9/16: Women, Gold, Blue - Allocating WPS-NJ - Pink Standard
9/16: Natasha Kai allocated to Sky Blue pro soccer team - Honolulu Advertiser
9/16: U.S. women's team to play Ireland at Giants Stadium Wednesday - Star-Ledger
9/16: Women's Professional Soccer U.S. national team allocation results - Examiner
9/16: The Original Three: Rampone, O'Reilly, Kai join to Sky Blue - Big Apple Soccer
9/16: Rampone allocated to Sky Blue FC - Asbury Park Press
9/15: East Brunswick's O'Reilly, Point Pleasant's Rampone to play for Sky Blue FC in WPS - Star-Ledger
Here's a great shot of Natasha Kai celebrating her game-winning goal against Ireland last night at Giants Stadium with her Sky Blue scarf (photo: Robyn McNeil)
Heather O'Reilly against Ireland (photo: Howard C. Smith/isiphotos.com)
Christie Rampone avoids the tackle of Ireland's Michele O'Brien, who played for Sky Blue's W-League team this past summer (photo: Howard C. Smith/isiphotos.com)
US Soccer President Sunil Gulati honors Christie Rampone for earning her 200th career cap (photo: Howard C. Smith/isiphotos.com)
Natasha Kai talks to reporters after the game with her Sky Blue scarf (photo: Howard C. Smith/isiphotos.com)
We're crazy busy, but we're psyched.
That's because come tomorrow, the big unveiling in Manhattan will reveal the first of our Sky Blue FC players--along with the rest of the teams new treasures, as the WNT pool will be divided up amongst the seven teams.
Then, the following day, Sky Blue will be working the crowds (hoping that means you) at Giants Stadium during the USA Victory tour game v. Ireland. Look for us there; we'll be the ones with the excited smiles, encouraging you to support the team, and WPS, with season ticket purchases. We have all worked so hard, and learned so much, to get this far. And we've just begun! It's fun to share a passion, to help something grow. And it's especially exciting for most of us on a personal level: you'll find at Sky Blue FC, each of us is passionate on something with personal meaning to us. And we want to share that with you.
After our press event tomorrow, read the papers and the Internet (especially our website); watch T.V. Join our Facebook network. Interact and encourage all your friends and family. Help us to sweep over the area with awareness and excitement for the team, and the league.
This week you'll be introduced to the first players at Sky Blue FC, and WPS. And you'll be introduced to us, at Giants Stadium.
SBS Blogger
Sky Blue Soccer officially announced the name for its pro women's team that will play in WPS next year. The team will be called Sky Blue FC. For more information about the naming of the team and the new team logo, visit the Sky Blue FC page on the WPS website.
SOMERSET, NJ (Sept. 9, 2008) - Sky Blue Soccer unveiled today the name and logo for its entry into Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) - the upcoming professional women's league. The Somerset, NJ based organization announced that its professional team will be called Sky Blue FC.
Sky Blue FC will be one of seven WPS franchises set to kick off the inaugural season in April 2009 with teams also playing in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, St. Louis, San Francisco Bay Area, and Washington DC. Sky Blue FC will play its home matches at Yurcak Field on the campus of Rutgers University in Piscataway, NJ.
In exactly one week, the members of the Olympic gold medal US National Team who are eligible for the WPS draft will converge on Manhattan. They will assemble with the staff of WPS and members of the media to announce the allocation draft to the various teams (set to MC is WPS investor and NBC MVP Steve Nash). We’ve been crazed and excited at Sky Blue, preparing to roll out the red carpet for our three allocated players, and the action on the following day, when the team takes on Ireland at Giants Stadium as part of its Victory Tour.
Please stop by at that game and say hello. We’ll have a tailgate in the parking lot, with a couple of Jersey Sky Blue players, and two tables inside the stadium. We want to gear up the drive to get you all to buy season tickets to our games, and promote upcoming events, such as our ACL injury prevention clinic on Sept. 20 at the SuperDome in Waldwick, NJ.
In the meantime, we’re getting press mention, such as about our new Women’s Professional Team name. Check out today’s column by Frank Giase in the NJ Star Ledger.
SBS Blogger
Giase: Bradley and US play it safe
The Star-Ledger - NJ.com - Newark,NJ,USA
by Frank Giase/The Star-Ledger Wednesday night's World Cup qualifier against Trinidad and Tobago in Bridgeview, Ill., will be an interesting litmus test for ...
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